


you've been acting awful tough lately

by sleeplessmiles



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-18
Updated: 2014-11-18
Packaged: 2018-02-26 04:55:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,104
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2638826
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sleeplessmiles/pseuds/sleeplessmiles
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>May finds Jemma working in the middle of the night. It would be less concerning if it wasn't the fifth time it had happened that week.</p><p>[Post-ep for 2x07]</p>
            </blockquote>





	you've been acting awful tough lately

**Author's Note:**

> Because (a) I refuse to believe no one is supporting Jemma, and (b) Jemma's more than capable of bursting the whole alien case right open, let's be real.

It was well past 1AM when May made her way through the darkened base to Jemma’s room, a tight knot of dread settling uncomfortably in her stomach. Listening first for any sounds from within the room (it was completely silent, which told her absolutely nothing – Jemma was a light sleeper), she knocked; three sharp raps, right in the centre of the door. If the young scientist _was_ in there, she’d be up and answering the door in less than thirty seconds, absurdly trying to make herself look like she hadn’t just been fast asleep. 

Just as she’d always done on the Bus.

It was weird, May thought – the things that remained defiantly the same despite everything else being so markedly different. She wasn’t prone to nostalgia, but it was getting harder to avoid with things the way they currently were.

(If she ever allowed herself a moment to contemplate it, she’d concede that it was the quiet knowledge that she missed the most. Back then, she’d known everyone’s sleeping habits, as well as how to wake them if necessary. It would take nothing less than continuous knocking to wake Fitz up – and, when that inevitably failed, shouted orders. She used to allocate Fitz-waking duties to either Jemma, whose voice seemed to be the only one that could rouse him, or Skye, who would break into his bunk to throw things at him until he woke up.

She wasn’t even sure she’d know how to go about a wake-up call now. She didn’t like to think about the distance and division that implied.)

When a minute passed by with no response, May sighed, the anxious ball in the pit of her stomach curling just that little bit tighter. She’d expected this. She’d hoped otherwise, of course, but she’d expected this.

After all, this made it the fifth night in a row.

Knocking once more in a show of optimism she wasn’t really feeling, she waited a few more moments before giving up and heading for the kitchen. After the girl’s bedroom, it was the least likely place to find Jemma these days. Best to rule it out early.

As she’d guessed, the kitchen was devoid of the petite scientist. Less expected, however, was the presence of Bobbi; the woman was sprawled out in a chair and gazing intently at a laptop. Glancing up at May, she smiled briefly in acknowledgement before turning her attention back to her screen.

(Bobbi understood the value of simply coexisting in silence. May liked Bobbi.)

‘Have you seen Simmons?’

Bobbi looked up properly this time, frowning slightly. ‘She’s not in her room?’

May shook her head. Bobbi just sighed.

‘Lab or echo chamber, then. My money’s on the echo chamber. She is _really_ determined to crack this thing.’

May made a soft sound of agreement. Truth be told, she’d hedge her bets on the echo chamber too. It’s where Jemma had been every other night this week, not to mention where she spent most of her days. It wasn’t that the girl had given up on the Fitz situation, either: far from it, in fact. She’d simply become enamoured with the idea of a new puzzle to solve, in true Jemma Simmons fashion.

The familiarity of it would almost be comforting, really, if the girl’s every excited smile didn’t have such a bittersweet twist to it.

May had taken to waiting up in the kitchen at night, her presence dissuading the girl from consuming any more coffee beyond a certain time and thus forcing her to bed. It seemed tonight promised more of the same.

‘Actually,’ Bobbi began slowly, closing her laptop and leaning forward. ‘About that. Don’t you think it’s time we stepped in?’

May was shaking her head before Bobbi had even finished her sentence.

‘She’s still trying to find her feet. Give her time.’

Bobbi set her laptop on the table, running a hand over her face tiredly. ‘Look, I’m all for her doing the teambuilding thing, but she went through some pretty fucked up stuff at Hydra.’

May knew that. God, did she know that. The brainwashing that Jemma had been complicit in triggering, the fact that she had almost been subjected to the same, was more than enough to make May lose sleep. She could barely imagine what it was doing to someone who’d actually experienced it – especially someone like Jemma. If she didn’t know Jemma, she’d wonder how the girl was even standing, let alone functioning.

But she _did_ know Jemma.

‘It’s not easy to come back after a longer op. You know that. She’ll have to deal with it at some point, but not yet.’

‘Okay, well, I don’t know what that point looks like to _you_ , but to me? Looks a hell of a lot like this.’

May felt her shoulders sag a little. ‘No change tonight then?’

Bobbi shrugged, leaning back in her chair. ‘I mean, she actually came into the kitchen, so that’s an improvement. She was clearly still…’ she waved a hand vaguely in front of her face, ‘in the zone, or whatever, frowning away, but she ate something.’

‘Much?’

She shook her head with a slight grimace. ‘Not really. Cup of tea and a bit of toast, but she abandoned that as soon as Fitz came in. Which, I’ll be honest with you, I don’t really understand.’

It was May’s turn to shake her head.

‘Seriously?’

‘Not my story to tell.’

Bobbi raised her eyebrows in disbelief, but she seemed to content to drop it for now. ‘Oookay, whatever you say. But weird undertones aside, she’s hit crisis point here.’

May thought of the wide-eyed, concerned expression Skye kept shooting her after Jemma threatened to kill Ward. It felt a lot like crisis point had been reached a few weeks back.

‘May, she’s going to run herself into the ground unless we do something.’

‘She just needs a chance to – ’

‘ – May.’ Bobbi sat up straighter in her chair. ‘Due respect, but she’s _had_ a chance. It doesn’t have to be a big thing. I can go to her, tell her I’m worried, do you want to talk about it – ’

‘ – No.’

‘Hell, _you_ can do it, if it makes you feel – ’ 

‘She won’t _listen_ , Bobbi,’ May exclaimed. Bobbi fell silent at the sheer vehemence in the statement. May took a quiet breath in, trying to quell her sense of desperate helplessness at the situation, before continuing quietly. ‘She thinks she’s holding it together. We go to her, and she’ll think she’s failed.’

Bobbi frowned. ‘It’s not a failure.’

‘It is to Jemma.’ May shook her head, swallowed. ‘She’ll be even more determined to hold it all in.’

The expression on the other woman’s face was deeply saddened. May understood it completely. She’d been grappling with this for weeks.

‘I won’t have her thinking no one believes she can do this,’ May said quietly, ferocity lacing her every word. This was the only truth she knew in this whole situation.

‘But she _can_ do this,’ Bobbi affirmed softly.

May nodded slowly. ‘That’s what we have to show her.’

‘By… doing what, exactly? Just watching it happen? May, it’s like watching a supernova collapse.’

‘By _supporting_ her. Being present.’

The expression Bobbi made in response was one of almost comical distaste. ‘Non-action. Great. My favourite.’

May hummed in agreement. She could relate.

Twisting her mouth unhappily, Bobbi deliberated for a few moments, before exhaling heavily. 'Alright. Fine. But if this gets any worse, I'm stepping in.'

'That's fair.'

Silence reigned for a while as both women contemplated the implications of the situation. Finally, Bobbi disrupted the quiet.

‘Okay, I have another question,’ Bobbi began, and leaning forward conspiratorially. ‘Is everyone on your team this ridiculously infuriating? I mean, was it on the entrance criteria or something?’

May smirked tiredly. ‘You tell me. They’re your team too.’

‘Yeah.’ Bobbi’s face split into a small, fond smile at that, the shocked sincerity breaking through the moment. ‘Yeah, they are.’

Not for the first time, May felt a surge of gratitude for the other woman’s presence. Her people were in good hands.

After another short, comfortable pause, Bobbi rolled her shoulders.

‘Alright, I think that’s me for the night. You’ve got this?’

At May’s nod, Bobbi stood, lazily stretching her arms above her head and stifling a yawn, before seeming to remember something. She cocked her head at May. ‘You’re _really_ not going to tell me what the deal is with her and Fitz, are you.’

May simply looked at her. Bobbi smirked back, nodding to herself as she picked up her laptop.

‘Right. Goodnight, May.’

She almost to the door before May decided to speak up again.

‘Bobbi.’

The woman stopped just inside the doorway, turning back around.

‘She _will_ need someone to talk to. When she’s ready.’

Bobbi smiled again, small and genuine. ‘She’ll have it.’

Once she was alone in the kitchen, May simply stood there for a few minutes, quietly assessing her next course of action. She didn’t think she could simply wait for Jemma to finish up for the night again. Maybe Bobbi was right after all; maybe she could get away with being a little more active in the situation. She’d largely remained out of it until this point, but perhaps she could apply just the slightest amount of pressure.

She owed Jemma that much, at least.

Decided, May strode from the room, heading for the echo chamber.

 

\--

\--

 

When she reached the empty bay where they’d set up the echo chamber, the sight that awaited May was enough to stop her in her tracks. Jemma was sitting on the ground, feet tucked neatly beneath her body and her notes spread across the floor in front of her. The only light came from the eerie blue of the alien writing projected in the air above her, casting a surreal blue glow across her skin.

May felt a pang of discomfort in her chest.

 _She looks so young._  

(Part of May wanted to just tell the girl to run away from this stuff and never look back. The rest of her knew how futile an endeavour that would be; how thoroughly the exact opposite was programmed into Jemma’s DNA.)

By chance, Jemma looked up in May’s general direction, jumping when she saw her there. ‘Oh, Agent May! You startled me.’

_Keep your cool._

‘Pretty late to be working, isn’t it?’ May ventured conversationally, moving further into the room. Jemma looked up at her guiltily.

‘I don’t think I’d be able to sleep right now, I’m afraid.’

  _Ah._

‘The blueprints?’ May asked, giving her an out. She walked over to where Jemma had spread her notes out.

‘See, that’s what I’ve been thinking about,’ Jemma began, climbing to her feet. ‘What if we’ve been coming at this from the wrong angle?’

The girl launched into a detailed explanation of her thinking, but May wasn’t listening now. Not when she’d gotten close enough to see Jemma’s notes.

Not when she could see the hundreds of alien writings scrawled across the pages.

Oh, _God._

Jemma had conducted the autopsy personally. Was GH-325 transmissible that way? Could she have accidentally infected herself? Did she even realise?

_Not her too._

Trying to quash the sudden panic bubbling up in her chest, May looked back up at Jemma, who had moved to stand on a chair and was now swiping enthusiastically at the holographic grid, chattering away.

‘… and just because we know that they’re blueprints now, doesn’t mean that that’s _all_ they are. It doesn’t have to be just the one thing, not when there could – ’

‘Did you draw these?’ May cut in, voice sharp.

‘Hmm?’ She looked briefly away from the echo chamber – just long enough to see what May was pointing at – before turning back to the hologram. ‘Oh! Yes, those are mine. Anyway, so I was thinking – ’

‘ _– Jemma._ ’

At May’s tone, Jemma fell abruptly silent, looking back across in alarm. May forced out a shaky breath, trying to find some semblance of calm.

‘How long have you been sketching these patterns?’

Jemma’s brow furrowed in confusion. ‘Only since I started working on…’ She trailed off as comprehension seemed to dawn on her features. Her mouth opened in a wordless ‘oh.’

‘Do you – I don’t have hypergraphia, if that’s what you’re insinuating.’

The panic in May’s chest subsided, but only barely.

_Just because she doesn’t recognise it doesn’t mean it isn’t happening._

‘And you’re certain. There’s no chance that the autopsy…’

‘No, there’s no chance,’ she replied softly, eyes wide and painfully understanding.

Of course there wasn’t. Of course Jemma would observe every possible safety precaution.

Shit. This stuff was really doing a number on May. She nodded briskly.

‘Okay. You were saying?’

‘May,’ Jemma began, too gentle.

‘It’s fine. What am I looking at?’ she gritted out, voice as firm as she could muster. God. The last thing she needed was to give the girl something else to worry about.

Jemma shot another concerned glance at May before jumping down from the chair and turning back to her sketches.

‘Well… they’re all reproductions I’ve created of various sections. See, those are Coulson’s engravings… Garrett’s,’ she rattled off, pointing out each diagram in turn.

‘And _these_ ,’ she brandished a hand at some pages that had clearly been marked with a different pen. ‘These are what Skye could remember seeing on the obelisk when Agent… well.’

The younger girl met May’s eyes, seeking permission to breach the touchy subject. May signalled for her to continue.

‘It’s these ones that I find especially intriguing, because why would you put blueprints on an object such as the obelisk? It just doesn’t seem rational to me.’

She looked up at May expectantly, eyes wide with this new, subdued brand of excitement she seemed to specialise in lately. May shook her head, having no idea where she was going with this.

‘What are you saying?’

And there it was. Just like that, a flash of the Jemma she knew. A pleased grin crept onto her face, bordering on smugness. ‘Wouldn’t you say the markings look rather like an electrical circuit?’

May looked over at the echo chamber, tilting her head. The markings were different, sure, but it did bear a resemblance to circuitry notation. She looked back to Jemma in awe.

‘So you think the symbols correspond to…’

‘Switches, resistors: all the components of a circuit, yes.’

Then, something weird happened.

Jemma looked away.

_Odd._

‘What if it’s _more_ than simply a blueprint? What if it’s also an electrical fingerprint of some description? That could explain the biological reaction that occurs when contact is made with the metal.’

The girl was studiously avoiding eye contact now. Alarm bells were ringing in May’s head.

‘If we could somehow determine how that interaction occurs by first deciphering the circuitry, then we should be able to ascertain the obelisk’s function.’

‘Jemma…’

‘There’s got to be science behind the obelisk too. Maybe it doesn’t function the way ours does, but that doesn’t mean we can dismiss it as inexplicable.’

‘Jemma.’

The girl took a deep breath and looked up to meet May’s gaze head on. 

‘I want to try to reverse engineer the obelisk.’

_Of course you do._

May exhaled shakily, swallowing down the instinctive ‘no’ that threatened to rip from her throat.

‘It’s incredibly dangerous.’

‘Yes, but we’d only be experimenting on alien metals. We wouldn’t be working directly _with_ the obelisk – unless, of course, we somehow managed to acquire it.’

‘In which case you _definitely_ wouldn’t be working with it.’

‘Well _somebody_ has to,’ she blurted out.

May stared at her, shocked. She seemed just as shocked at her outburst.

 _Shit_.

‘Jemma – ’

‘No, wait. Just let me…’ she smiled tremulously. ‘I didn’t mean that how it sounded.’

May waited her out, watching her collect herself with a growing sense of dread.

‘We just keep chasing Hydra,’ the girl began. The tentative smile was well and truly gone now. ‘And that’s all we do. Which is… it’s fine, of course it is. It has to be done. To keep people safe.’

She took another deep breath, choosing her words carefully.

‘But that’s not how _I_ keep people safe. I’m a scientist, May. I’ve been presented with a device that could kill millions of people, and it’s my responsibility to prevent that from happening.’

May looked at this brave young girl – chin jutted out, face set in determination – and despite herself, despite everything, she felt a now-familiar swell of pride and disbelief.

(She didn’t think there was another human being alive who considered it their responsibility to safeguard the wellbeing of everyone on earth.)

‘I know that it’s dangerous,’ she continued, casting her eyes briefly downwards. ‘I know. But it’s a controlled risk, which is more than I can say for most things I’ve done for this organisation lately.’

She was right. Of course she was right. This was the area in which Jemma excelled, in which she had always been superior. The past year had shown that the girl could rise to the top of any situation she was thrown into, but this was truly her forte.

_God. I’m actually going to agree to this._

‘This is as much engineering as it is biochem.’

Jemma inhaled softly. ‘Yes.’

May pinned her with an evaluating gaze. ‘You think he’s up for it?’

‘I think…’ she took a deep breath, squaring her shoulders. ‘I think that’s up to him to decide.’

_Shit._

‘I don’t like this,’ May found herself murmuring, almost involuntarily. She could feel Jemma’s eyes on her, but she kept looking straight ahead anyway. ‘Any of it.’

Jemma hummed in agreement. Then, after a short, contemplative pause:

‘It can’t have been easy, watching Coulson go through all of that.’

Shocked at how she’d managed to glean that from such a basic comment, May looked across to meet the Jemma’s gaze. Her eyes held far too much understanding for a girl her age.

But that was it, wasn’t it. That was how she was still standing, how she was still fighting. The world had spat in her face, given her every reason to be overrun by fear and anger, and yet here she was, concerned for _May_ of all people, and willing to put her life on the line for the wellbeing of every other person on the planet.

The resilience of Jemma Simmons’ compassion was staggering.

And there was no way in hell May was going to be complicit in snuffing that out.

‘I’ll talk to Coulson.’

Jemma’s entire body seemed to relax.

(May’s only tensed up further.

What had she started?)

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!
> 
> I'll be posting a continuation of this in a few days, where Jemma and Fitz start to work on alien metals (and it completely backfires on them) so if you're interested, watch this space!


End file.
